Tom

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT TOM - PAGE 2

Kudos to Tim Gregory's fascinating and endearing article about Lucie, the wild turkey who's recently won over the hearts and minds of a subdivision in Bartlett, Ill. ("Neighborhood adopts perfect Thanksgiving guest," Nov. 19). Lucie is a shining example of the human-animal bond. Often, when people have the chance to interact with farm animals, they begin to see they all have individual personalities and quirks just like cats and dogs. They are intelligent and sensitive creatures, and most importantly, have the same capacity to feel pain and suffering.

"Here Where It's Safe" ✭✭1/2 There's a fine play in here somewhere, about the fuzzy line between good intentions and the commercialization of childbirth. After several miscarriages, an American couple seeks out a surrogate in India, where an entire industry exists to help people very much like them. It's a premise with just enough hooks to keep audiences emotionally and intellectually engaged, and playwright M.E.H. Lewis is smart enough to acknowledge the various sides of the issue and the inevitable conflicting emotions.

Tom Knightly, 59, a general-assignment reporter with the Gary Post-Tribune, had been a staff writer there for 28 years. He won journalistic awards for stories on Gary's murder rate, property taxes and several local scams. A resident of the Miller section of Gary, he died Monday of a heart attack at Northwest Family Hospital in Gary after a workout at a fitness center. "Tom was the consumate general-assignment reporter," said fellow journalist Chris Isidore. "He was a real pro and solid in everything he did. If there were a big story, he would be on the scene and doing a solid job."

Dear Ann Landers: I am in a state of shock and need your help. My fiance is a highly respected, successful attorney, masculine in every way. Last night, "Tom" confided that he likes to wear women's clothes on Sunday afternoons. (Never in public, however.) He described in detail his secret wardrobe, wigs, lingerie, satin nighties, high heels and padded bras. This man has no homosexual characteristics. In fact, he is very macho, works out four times a week and is a very satisfying lover.

Dear Cheryl: I am 36 years old, with two kids, and I live in Soweto, South Africa. I've just started a relationship with Tom, a fabulous guy, but I refuse to admit that he's fabulous. I compare him with all the guys who've taken my breath away over the years. There are no goose bumps when Tom touches me, no butterflies in my stomach when he kisses me. So, I've come up with all sorts of reasons to reject him. I refuse to accept that he could be just the man I need in my life. Tom is stable, holds down a good job, has his own house and is basically getting on with life.

As a top collegiate basketball official, Tinley Park's Tom O'Neill Sr. knows how to keep the game going in a pressure situation. After all, he's faced the ultimate form of pressure: legendary Indiana University coach Bobby Knight. "He was on me one day three years ago," said O'Neill, who had made a call that sent the opposing team to the free-throw line. "He said to me, `You know, O'Neill, wouldn't the game of basketball be a great game without officials?' " O'Neill calmly looked back at Knight, the man who once threw a chair onto the court when he didn't like an official's call.

Our 4-year-old son was especially lively when he got home from preschool. The reason was obvious as he walked in the door and said, "Sarah talked to me today!" Tom had been talking about Sarah a lot. Sarah is new to Tom's preschool this year. The first time he mentioned her, I didn`t pay much attention. But I began to notice that when Tom talked of Sarah it was different from the way he spoke of other classmates. Usually when he spoke of others it was matter-of-fact, telling me what they did together, or if someone hit him or teased him. When he spoke of Sarah, he always had a smile.

T.S. Eliot, that most dogmatically impersonal of poets, might have been shocked by the biographical film on his life, "Tom & Viv." And not just because the picture paints him as a cold fish, perhaps even a bit of a cad, but also by the sheer rudeness, impropriety and scandal. Dealing with Eliot's tormented marriage to British aristocrat Vivienne Haigh-Wood-the period when the century's most highly praised English poet wrote some of his greatest works, including "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and "The Wasteland"-this fitfully fine and intelligent film pulls us into the tumult of the Eliots' private lives and anguish.

Dear Abby: My son, "Max," is 14. We have always been able to talk about everything. I have always told him he could trust me and his father. I am very proud of him. Yesterday I was shocked speechless because Max shaved his legs! Although I almost had a heart attack, I tried to remain calm. He says that all his friends are doing it, and that the girls like it. His father sat down with him and told him that men do not shave their legs. My son says it is the fashion, and hairy legs are not "in."

Thomas B. Baldwin, 38, a State Farm Insurance agent and a former defensive lineman for the New York Jets, died of a heart attack Tuesday, May 2, in his Naperville home. "He was the single most fierce competitor I have ever come up against," said his brother Brian. Born in Chicago, Mr. Baldwin grew up in Lansing and was drafted by the New York Jets in his senior year at Tulsa University, where he earned a degree in history. He played professional football from 1984 to 1988.